The Psychological Content of Relationship between Sense and Meaning in Cultural-Historical Approach

Abstract

The paper considers L.S. Vygotsky’s cultural-historical theory and its interpretation in modern psychology. It shows that psychological content of many concepts introduced by L.S. Vygotsky differs greatly from that of the ones used in theory and practice of modern psychological science. The authors state that L.S. Vygotsky’s main idea which shapes the specifics of cultural-historical psychology is the idea of sense primacy in relation to meaning. The analysis of subject content of the concept of «cultural development» allows us to affirm that L.S. Vygotsky understood the essence of learning process somewhat differently from what is now accepted. Learning in cultural-historical psychology promotes the development of will and self-regulation. Meanwhile, learning is seen not as a transformation of the external into the internal (process of interiorization), but as the ability to realize oneself in the outer world. At the same time, an important role in mental development and learning is played by another mental function, imagination.

Keywords

• cultural-historical theory
• non-classical psychology
• meaning
• sense
• experimental genetic method
• cultural development
• socialization
• imagination